BSc Psychology or BSc Mental Health Nurse?

I don’t know what to do. I want to become a Psychologist so bad and yet the amount of people that have failed in this career or have used their degrees for something else is alarming. MHN seems good too but I have no experience and I haven’t prepared a good personal statement for it. I seriously don’t know what to do and it’s weighing me down. Pls help!!!

To become a psychologist you need an accredited degree and a postgraduate qualification (and you will face a lot of competition for the latter). It's not alarming that many graduates don't continue in the field. Many students take a subject at uni that they are interested in and enjoy, but then apply for unrelated jobs in grad schemes. You pick up many transferable skills in uni that are attractive to a range of employees.

https://nationalcareers.service.gov.uk/job-profiles/psychologist

You don't need to rush into uni straight from A levels so I recommend you consider taking a year out to work out what you want to do. Consider working in a care home to gain some caring experience and try to get some shadowing experience for MNH and with a psychologist.

To become a psychologist you need an accredited degree and a postgraduate qualification (and you will face a lot of competition for the latter). It's not alarming that many graduates don't continue in the field. Many students take a subject at uni that they are interested in and enjoy, but then apply for unrelated jobs in grad schemes. You pick up many transferable skills in uni that are attractive to a range of employees.

https://nationalcareers.service.gov.uk/job-profiles/psychologist

You don't need to rush into uni straight from A levels so I recommend you consider taking a year out to work out what you want to do. Consider working in a care home to gain some caring experience and try to get some shadowing experience for MNH and with a psychologist.

I don’t know what to do. I want to become a Psychologist so bad and yet the amount of people that have failed in this career or have used their degrees for something else is alarming. MHN seems good too but I have no experience and I haven’t prepared a good personal statement for it. I seriously don’t know what to do and it’s weighing me down. Pls help!!!

What part of psychology really interests you? Mental health nursing is very treatment and care-based due to the nursing element which some people love but others not so much. Have you considered Social Work? The varying range of people and situations you would work in might appeal to you more with an interest in psychology, I would definitely recommend taking a look as it isn't a clinical degree, and your personal statement might also align more with some tweaks. Once you have your degree, you can become a social worker or work in related areas like counselling, therapy, psychological wellbeing, or working with offenders on rehabilitation 🙂

@P.r.i.n.z.y
There is some great advice on here already. If you did become a mental health nurse first and wanted to do an MSc conversion course in Psychology, I did the one at Arden University. The unique selling point for you is that there is a 100% online option where you can fit it around your work commitments (I was teaching full time at the same thing), but there are also blended learning options in Leeds, Manchester, Birmingham and London. The course is fully accredited by the BPS and would open up doctorate level study going forward

Marc
Arden University Student Ambassador

Another option could be to train as a mental health nurse first. If after that you still want to become a clinical psychologist then you can take a BPS accredited postgraduate psychology conversion course which takes 1 year full time (and part time options are available). The conversion course qualifies you to apply for the clinical psychology training programmes, and also allows you to build up relevant experience from nursing, but with the security of a nursing job should you be unsuccessful in applying.

Look on the British Psychological Society's accredited course search for conversion courses.

☹️ oh goodness. I already effing applied 😭😭😭😭. I am so sad omg 😭😭😭😭.

Do you think I could convert to a Mental Health Nurse course easily in my first year of University?

Generally, transferring to a nursing course isn't simple as you have to be interviewed,get DBS checks, and occupational health declarations done.

If you only applied within the last 14 days via UCAS, then you can swap your choices out, and ask nursing unis if you can send an updated personnal statement to them. There are usually unfilled nursing course spaces still available after the UCAS January cutoff. Best thing is to contact likely nursing unis for you, and explain your situation. Good luck

Okay that does sound good but I don’t have experience to add to the personal statement concerning mental health nursing so I highly doubt they’d take my application seriously or consider me a good candidate :/. It’s all very scary and I don’t want to apply for a course that won’t take me on

Many applicants applying for nursing are just 17 or 18, and so unlikely to have much in the way of experience. If you have had some caring experience with a family member (e.g. assisting a grandparent), or even a non-care job can be useful e.g. shop assistant shows teamwork, communication, and working professionally with members of the public. If none of that applies to you, just explain that to unis you contact, and say you'll be seeking out some shadowing or work experience in the meantime (so you could discuss it at interview instead of in your PS).

It's usually more important to discuss your motivations for why mental health nursing: general interest in the subject, experiences of family member or you navigating mental health services, etc.

It won't harm you to contact the unis of interest and see what they say. Even if you carry on doing the BSc Psychology, and decide you want to go into mental health nursing after, there are 2 year postgraduate nursing conversion courses that will give you full student finance funding. So no matter which route you take, you are not excluded from changing direction after graduation

Thank you so so much for all your help ☺️. As deadlines are very close and I’m doing mocks + extra stuff, I will go on with the Psychology course and then try my hardest to do the PG Mental health nursing conversion course! I am yet to write a personal statement for MHN as I have been doing mock exams + volunteer training so I don’t think I’ll be able to now, but I hope it all works out in the end. Again, you’ve been one of the most helpful people I’ve talked to on here and I thank you for that <3.